bring the right gear for this sort of injury.” When the pillow was in place, Jasper checked the pulse again. “Real good fucking job, brother. Pulse is picking up.”
Bodie whined.
“You’re a fucking legend, poppet. I know grown men who’ve cried like babies with injuries nowhere near as bad as this. Wait until I tell them about the little wisp of a woman who put them all to shame.” Jasper smiled at her, but Braun saw the strain around his friend’s eyes and mouth. “I need you to be just this strong one more time, okay, poppet? One more time.”
Her eyes cracked open, swimming with pain that turned blue to midnight. Her breath whistled uneasily through clenched teeth.
Jasper repeated his examination on her left leg, carefully feeling for the break. He gestured to Atticus with his chin when he located it, further down near her ankle. “This one’s not as bad as the first, Bodie. Nowhere near. Two minutes and we’ll have you strapped up.”
When Atticus took over holding her ankle, Jasper plucked another bandage free. “Just like last time, brother. Nice and steady.”
Bodie’s hand lifted a bare inch off the mattress. Braun immediately reached for it, curling his fingers lightly around hers. She’d gotten some licks in, he noted with pride. Her knuckles were puffy and red, her nails bloodied underneath. He squeezed carefully, aware he could hurt her more.
“We got two cruisers and an EMT rig!” Loki shouted from the front.
Jasper didn’t so much as blink as he wrangled the bone back into position. “Bandage it up, Atticus. You still got pressure on that head lac, Braun?”
“Yes. All good.”
“Excellent. We’re all done, poppet. You’ve done really well. Those drugs are about thirty seconds away, and you've damn well earned them.” Jasper rubbed the top of her feet slowly. “Circulation’s starting to come back.”
“Gonna be a lot of fucking questions we can’t answer,” Atticus said with a grunt. “Cops are gonna lose their shit over this.”
“We tell them the truth about what we know. It’s about time they started acting like cops when it comes to the fuckers who did this, because this sure as hell isn’t their first time beating someone to death’s door.” Braun leaned down and kissed Bodie’s forehead as her eyes became unfocused. “It’ll be their last, one way or another.”
“I’ve got connections,” Atticus murmured as footsteps hammered down the hallway and into the living room. “Just say the word and they’ll be sliced, diced, and part of the menu for the tigers at the zoo.”
The conversation ended as a whip-thin man approached the doorway in a medic's uniform. Two cops were on his heels, followed by another EMT.
Braun let Jasper take over again, explaining Bodie’s injuries and how he’d treated them as the EMTs got straight to action. He was nudged aside as they went to work, installing drips and shooting her with enough pain relief to last for a few hours.
He spoke to the cops, told them everything he had knowledge of, and while they wrote down what he said, he plotted. He planned.
This wasn’t over.
Chapter Fourteen
He hated hospitals with a passion.
That hatred quadrupled the longer he spent time in one.
From what the doctors were saying, this would be his new reality for many weeks to come...if Boadicea survived her injuries. Right now, that was a big fucking if. Her life hung in the balance. So much trauma to such a little body had consequences and it had become tragically clear over the past few hours just how much his little one had endured.
The sharp-faced, grim-eyed doctor who had initially taken charge of Bodie upon arrival hadn’t been the bearer of good news. Her voice had been gentle, compassionate, even when faced with a solid wall of dominant men, but her message had been an unmistakable warning: Be prepared to lose her.
Concussion, severe blood loss. Two broken legs, hairline fractures in her right arm and left cheekbone. Cracked ribs, internal bleeding, and a nasty laceration to the scalp.
Four hours after Bodie was rushed to the emergency room, it seemed all that was left to do was wait...and wait. Playing their last time together over and over through his mind, wondering if there was something different he could have done to change the course of her fate.
Of course, there was. There always was.
Wasn’t that the way of it? Life came down to choices, didn’t it? Every tiny decision a person made in the journey of their day could alter their future without them ever knowing.